My husband and I dated for three years and have been married for a year and three months. Up until we got married I was excited and in love and everything was great, because I refused to acknowledge any of his flaws. He lived with his parents and never had to do chores, his room was always a mess, and he was very into his computer and video games. I was stupid and didn’t realize that all of these behaviors would continue when we got married, so since then I have basically been depressed and constantly upset about the dishes, the laundry, the dirty bathroom, the clutter… everything. I know it isn’t fair to ask him to change but I can’t live with the mess and with someone who is comfortable being so messy. I need it neater. I feel so guilty because I married him… and I’m supposed to stay by his side and be faithful, right? I feel so guilty for feeling like marriage was a mistake. He’s been with me for my entire adult life (started dating when I was 18, got married TOO SOON at 21, and it’s been hellish and touch-and-go ever since.
A patient of mine has a mentally ill brother who's depressed and anxious, as well as manipulative and stubborn. He often refuses to take medication that's helped him in the past and as a result often ends up lying at home in his bed, unwashed and unkempt, for days at a time. When my friend discovers him in this state, she tries various things: taking him to the ER (which she's learned leads nowhere), contacting his therapist (which sometimes helps, sometimes not), and even walking away, both figuratively and literally. She struggles with how much she may be enabling his behavior and with how unhappy his unhappiness is making her. She vents to me on occasion, and I try to walk a fine line between encouraging her not to give up on him and supporting her decision to protect herself emotionally. Recently, he had a particularly bad episode and it got me wondering: how can we best manage the unhappiness of people we love?
Thank you for this blog post. I recently ended a relationship with someone who I love a great deal; but I finally realized that his depression was going to be a lifelong issue, and not one that he was willing to fully address. Of course, there is a lot of guilt that is going along with that decision, because I feel like I “abandoned” him when he needed me.
You mentioned someone going through a period of suffering in their life that they need time to get through (so this suffering is not permanent) and individuals who might have frequent dips in mood. I have a question about individuals who have a condition they have been affected by for a long time and will probably stay with them for the rest of their life. My mother has had what appears to me to be borderline personality disorder and/or bipolar disorder for the past 23 years since I was born. How much responsibility is placed on the person for their behavior who has difficulty controlling their moods? My mother can obviously control her behavior around strangers (maybe she is around strangers in times of better mood), but I see her take out her emotions, problems, aggressions in private on her caregivers (my grandfather and grandmother). She is not able to take responsibility for her actions at all and is not expected to by her caregivers. Is this appropriate? Is it appropriate to forgive her behavior in every instance? Or to hold her accountable for her actions? Should her rude behavior, explosive emotions, inability to listen be excused as something she has no control over? Or should the person be held accountable for certain aspects of her behavior? This is difficult for me to deal with because my emotions in response to her behavior when I am around her get discounted by my grandparents because they use the model where she "is not able to control herself at all so she must be forgiven in all circumstances". Is this model of forgiving every circumstance appropriate? Thank your for your response.

When two people have been together for a long time and have developed a routine and have accumulated a large plate of responsibilities, it’s not uncommon for one or both of the partners to start feeling overwhelmed. Sometimes there’s just a lot of pressure and a person involuntarily takes it out on their spouse. This can lead to a person feeling unappreciated and/or resentful…

I spoke with 10 relationship experts about how exactly to tell whether your partner is not so into your partnership — what are the hints? How can you know? What are the definitive signs? Though they all had different takes on the situation, they all had a lot of things to say about it, confirming our worst fears: It is totally possible to be in a loving relationship, and all seems well, but under the surface — well, you saw Jaws. Sounds like many relationships can seem perfectly fine, or at least OK, but there are some subtle exhibitions of discord or at least unrest that are worth keeping an eye out for in your partnership. Here are 10 whispers of strife in a relationship.

It took me a long while to realize my marriage was really over. I’ve been married 45+ years and right from the ‘I DO’s’ things turned horrible. We managed to have sex and intimacy on our wedding night, but that was short lived. Sex lasted maybe 20 minutes and he stayed in bed maybe another hour, then sat out by the pool the rest of the night. The next was an eye opener for me, first he told me how disgusting, messy, smelly, pointless, meaningless, vile to the point of him vomiting. We were suppose to go on a honeymoon, that never happened a total waste of money we really didn’t have. He took me home and said tonight I’m going to start working midnights and also I will be moving to the basement. He started eating, sleeping down stairs, also he built a apartment which didn’t include me. He worked all the time weekends, holiday’s, every one else’s vacation(he never took any of his vacation) according to his boss and the security people he slept in his station wagon at work a lot. One good thing he did do was pay all bills we owed, he never complained that I bought a new car and when I ran up good size bills on my credit card. He just seemed to hate me, wouldn’t talk to me, be with me and ignored me. Was my marriage over yes it was right from the beginning. I stayed because I was scared to go out on my own, I did have a beautiful roof over my head, had good benefits, and he pays the bills. I don’t care about myself or him, my days are winding down and it will be over for one of us.

Dear laurie,i guess i am on the same page as everyone else,,is it over? Ihave married the man of my dreams,so i thought…we have been married for 18y.together for 20y. we have a beautiful daughter,she is 18.was never easy,we had a long distance relation ship in the beggining,moved to other country,money was always an argument..i always worked full time plus taking care of my daughter and house,but i was never good enough,if i resume my 18y of marriage it all comes down to being blaimed for never being good enough.time passed and nothing changes,he puts me down as i am not a good house wife,not a good mother spends all his money,all this and me working 50h a week,i am not a big spender,but in his eyes thats all i do is spend his money,he killed my love for him,over time,i hate him more than i love him.what keep me is the ilusion of being madly in love with the man i meet 20y ago,i love him deeply still.he become bitter and sniky he hydes from me money,goes behind my back cancels aounts,so i get stuck with no money..everytime he does this things i hate him more,all what matters to him is cleaning and money..i care for my daughter that has been thru a lot and just recently stabelize emotionaly..i dont want to break her heart..what do i do?
As I read 7 ways to know if your marriage over I can say now out of 6 years this marriage has to end. I hate to do it but it’s known that I’m not what my husband want anymore. We argue I am accused of cheating because I go to church, everythings my fault when something goes wrong, I’m not allowed to talk about how I feel or I’m provoking an arguement it’s only how he feels that matters. I find porn websites all on the computer and thats my fault because he looks at that mess. He tells me I turn my back but he’ll wait until 3 in the morning after he gets off the web and decide he wants sex from me once a month. If I ask for sex it’s no i’m not up to it. Yes I can clearly see my marriage is over.
If you want to stop your husband from having an affair and save your family finance, you have to cultivate a generous disposition. While occasional giving to your spouse can produce moments of happiness, a generous disposition can engender a state of happiness. Generosity can be expressed in many ways. One of the best ways, and often the most appreciated, is when you give yourself completely to your partner.

Im not married but this suits my relationship of two years perfectly. Of course, finding this out in marriage is so much more difficult. Thank you. This writing eases my pain and makes me feel better about the situation. After he admitted to me he was angry Monday through Friday and wasn’t where he saw himself at 30 years of age, it was then I finally realized that no amount of talking, crying, and trying was going to make him love me back the way I love him. Everything made sense once he said that to me. I recently started my nursing career and I’m happy. I have hard days for sure but I come home feeling like I made a difference for someone that day. I feel fulfilled. I have a great family who is always there for me and I have most of the things I want. I dreamt about our future together and I found myself working my life around his but he just wasn’t on the same page. I told him during our final breakup that I knew he wasn’t happy at work but that I prayed for him everyday and will continue praying and he responded with “I’m not religious.” It hurt my heart that he didn’t see how much I care about him, how much I want to be on his team, and help him get through any struggle. I was his biggest fan. 🙁 But there’s nothing I can do about it and I see that now. It’s not me.

Me and my husband have been together for almost five years but we have only been married for 6 months. We have a 3 year old and a newborn together. For some reason this pregnancy that I just recently went throuh was the hardest thing I have ever had to do. It seems like right when I got pregnant and right when we got married he just started going out and like always hunting all of a sudden when I needed him the most. Everything I say seems to be wrong, he gets defensive no matter what it’s like everyone is out to get him but really everyone is just trying to help him. He drinks every single day and thinks he has no problem, my daughter loves him dearly but I just think I am only staying here for her sake and I know that I should be happy too. I am not sexuall attracted to him what so ever anymore because all he ever does is drink beer and not work half the time and never helps with anything around the house. I am just so done with it all and eveyone I know thinks that I am crazy for even being here at all anymore. I am just so scared of raising two kids on my own because I just feel like I will fail them and it is not their fault that their father doesn’t want to do the right thing and that’s why I am so scared and confuse when it comes to making that final decision. Ugh it is just so hard I am in my twenties and just feel so helpless!!!!

As we mentioned earlier, women consider that having a partner is the greatest reward for a man. Finally, they care about the house and the children. Unfortunately, men with time, begin to feel less and less cared by their wives. They want women to be their supporter and partner and give something to them. But certain habits are hard to change, so there is a need for sincere conversation and understanding. You want him to keep saying that you are great, but when have you told him the same thing?

If you want to stop your husband from cheating, you must devise a good plan for your marriage. No marriage can succeed without a plan. Building a marriage is like building a house; you must have a burning desire to make it work. You need to develop a plan for the marriage and every day sit down with your spouse and show him your plan. During this time, let him see the cost involved in building a successful marriage, taking care of the home and the kid's education. Soon, your husband will realize the cost of his cheating and will discover it is not worthy to be spending money and time outside on strange women when the one he is married to is a better planner and organizer.

Me and my husband have been together for almost five years but we have only been married for 6 months. We have a 3 year old and a newborn together. For some reason this pregnancy that I just recently went throuh was the hardest thing I have ever had to do. It seems like right when I got pregnant and right when we got married he just started going out and like always hunting all of a sudden when I needed him the most. Everything I say seems to be wrong, he gets defensive no matter what it’s like everyone is out to get him but really everyone is just trying to help him. He drinks every single day and thinks he has no problem, my daughter loves him dearly but I just think I am only staying here for her sake and I know that I should be happy too. I am not sexuall attracted to him what so ever anymore because all he ever does is drink beer and not work half the time and never helps with anything around the house. I am just so done with it all and eveyone I know thinks that I am crazy for even being here at all anymore. I am just so scared of raising two kids on my own because I just feel like I will fail them and it is not their fault that their father doesn’t want to do the right thing and that’s why I am so scared and confuse when it comes to making that final decision. Ugh it is just so hard I am in my twenties and just feel so helpless!!!!
To counteract this impulse, remember that suffering is necessary for growth (I'm not pointing this out to rationalize suffering, but rather to suggest our focus should be on using it as a catalyst). If we can resist the impulse to treat suffering like a fire that must be extinguished immediately, we can consider with a clear mind how to best respond to the unhappiness of the ones we love. But if instead we give in to our impulse to take over responsibility for someone else's suffering, we may find ourselves cheating them out of an important growth experience. True happiness comes from strength. If we solve every problem for the ones we love, how will they ever learn to solve problems themselves?
In my own experience, when I allowed my circumstances to dictate my joy, my family was destined to ride with me on the roller coaster of my emotions. I did not become a joyful wife and mom until I learned the importance of spending time in prayer and daily Bible study. In other words, I needed to look to God. I could not expect Steve to give me a life free from difficulty so I would be happy. I could not ask him to do for me what only God can do.

"Often -- but not always -- women nag because men don’t follow through. How many times have you had a conversation about doing something and he commits to doing it and never follows through? Often, I'm guessing," she said. "Women feel caught in the middle: You continue to try and talk to him and address the issue but it goes nowhere. He interprets your request as nagging. You want to believe him but his promises go unfulfilled."

It took me a long while to realize my marriage was really over. I’ve been married 45+ years and right from the ‘I DO’s’ things turned horrible. We managed to have sex and intimacy on our wedding night, but that was short lived. Sex lasted maybe 20 minutes and he stayed in bed maybe another hour, then sat out by the pool the rest of the night. The next was an eye opener for me, first he told me how disgusting, messy, smelly, pointless, meaningless, vile to the point of him vomiting. We were suppose to go on a honeymoon, that never happened a total waste of money we really didn’t have. He took me home and said tonight I’m going to start working midnights and also I will be moving to the basement. He started eating, sleeping down stairs, also he built a apartment which didn’t include me. He worked all the time weekends, holiday’s, every one else’s vacation(he never took any of his vacation) according to his boss and the security people he slept in his station wagon at work a lot. One good thing he did do was pay all bills we owed, he never complained that I bought a new car and when I ran up good size bills on my credit card. He just seemed to hate me, wouldn’t talk to me, be with me and ignored me. Was my marriage over yes it was right from the beginning. I stayed because I was scared to go out on my own, I did have a beautiful roof over my head, had good benefits, and he pays the bills. I don’t care about myself or him, my days are winding down and it will be over for one of us.

I know that we are good together, I know that we both love each other deepy, but we are in a rut and I dont know how to get out of it. I want to be that fun, care free girl that he fell in love with and stop harping on the little things that he does wrong, but its so hard when I am hurting so much. I would just like some advice on ways that I can get us to be closer again, and eliminate the drama from our relationship. We enjoy each others personalityies and sense of humor. We are wildly attracted to each other. We are best friends, I just dont know how we got to this point and I am desperate to get out of it.